


Two exterminators walk into a bar

by nasimwrites



Category: Artemis Fowl - Eoin Colfer
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-21
Updated: 2019-12-21
Packaged: 2021-02-26 06:00:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,522
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21888577
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nasimwrites/pseuds/nasimwrites
Summary: A local pub tries to make sense of recent developments at the Fowl mansion.
Comments: 14
Kudos: 198
Collections: Artemis Fowl Yuletide





	Two exterminators walk into a bar

**Author's Note:**

  * For [theoffkeydiva](https://archiveofourown.org/users/theoffkeydiva/gifts).



It had been a strange few days, yes, but Declan doubted it warranted this level of attention. His sleepy town had officially reached a new level of monotony when the smallest change in a family’s routine made them rush to the local pub to exchange gossip.

Old Frank McNab, in particular, was obsessed with the current state of affairs.

“Turns out, the old lady weren’t dead after all!” he announced to the small crowd that had gathered for an early evening drink. “Saw her leaving the house this morning, all fancy-like, in that posh car with the big butler.”

Declan himself stuck to the policy of keeping his mouth shut. He wasn’t one to spread stories, especially when a sick parent was involved, and much less when it came to the Fowl family. He just handed out drinks, took money and wiped down tables as chatty neighbors came and went. But he couldn’t really help it if people came to _him_ , or if the combined force of people’s questions started to create small, little questions of his own. Sometimes, he couldn’t help himself.

“No one ever said she was dead, Frank,” Declan said.

“Gone mad,” said someone else.

“Schizophrenia, I hear.”

“I thought it was a coma!”

“Well, either way.” Frank waved a hand dismissively. “She’s up and about, and so’s a lot of people around there all of a sudden. From one day to another, plumbers and construction workers and exterminators, and off she is to go shopping like nothing’s wrong!”

“Building an underground vault, I bet,” Miss Dottie said from a nearby table, turning away from her date. People had always theorized that the Fowl family was hoarding some kind of treasure under their massive mansion.

“Oh, but I’m so happy for that little boy—must have missed his mother something terrible!”

“That little boy’s got the crazy gene himself,” Dottie said. “Acts like a big man in a little kid’s body.”

“I always said him and that big butler switched brains,” someone joked, and was met with uproarious laughter.

McNab shook his head. “Well, he’s with his mother now, which we should all be happy about. It was always a shame that the lad had to be wrapped up in crime from the moment he was born.”

A hush fell among the people in the pub. Everyone knew about Artemis Fowl I’s involvement in crime, of course. They all remembered what it had been like before the man went missing: strange cars moving back and forth, people walking in and never walking out, investigators appearing at the bar with questions even they were too afraid to hear answered. Back then, Declan hadn’t said a word to any of them, and kept the murmurs at the bar to a minimum; the last thing he had wanted was a visit from Fowl’s men.

There was people who’d been quick to forget what those times had been like, and now enjoyed gossiping about the little Fowl boy as if he was any other town child. But Declan had an uncomfortable feeling that the sudden normalcy at the Fowls’ might mean that something new was afoot. When it came to the Fowls, nothing was ever the way you expected it.

About twenty minutes later, when conversation in the pub had steered away from the topic of the Fowls, two burly, tired-looking men in drab blue jumpsuits wandered in and ordered a couple of beers. It wasn’t until one of them turned around in response to the strange looks they were getting from across the pub that Declan saw _PEST CONTROL_ written on the backs of their uniforms.

Old McNab immediately took the look as an invitation. “Hey, were you lot just up at the big house?”

The man who had just looked around took it in stride with a small shrug. “Yeah. Big project up there.”

“Rats? I hear big places like that are teeming with ‘em.”

The second exterminator took a big swig from the mug Declan handed him. “You’ve got that right.”

“It’ll take a while, then?” McNab glanced at Declan. “I bet the lady woke up terrified at the state of her house. I guess she ran for the hills and brought them in—” he pointed a thumb in the men’s direction. “—to poison everything.”

But before Declan could say anything, the two exterminators shared a look.

“She seemed pretty well put-together to me,” the first one said. “But she’s not the one who called us in.”

“Who did?”

“Her boy. And it wasn’t to poison anything, either. This was a cleaning job.”

At that, Dottie gave up any pretense of paying attention to her date and turned fully in her chair. “Cleaning up _what_?”

The two men glanced at each other again. “Just about anything you can imagine.”

“The house was just fine,” one of them put in quickly. “I’ve never seen anything that pretty, really. They just had dead things everywhere—flies, mosquitoes, spiders, rats, all sorts of bugs. Something took them all out at once. It was ridiculous.”

“Some kind of new poison?”

“Believe me, if there was such a thing that killed _everything_ except for humans, we’d all be using it. It doesn’t make any sense to me. I’d say it was the easiest job we ever had if it weren’t for the _amount_ of it all… that house is big and was hiding a lot of critters.”

“And they’re doing new construction there, with all that?” Dottie looked scandalized, but Declan could see the curiosity in her eyes.

“Wouldn’t know anything about that, miss. As far as I know, they’re just fixing stuff. Broken pipes, leveling ground under the house.”

A voice piped up from the back: Alfie, an old man whose Parkinson sometimes flared up so bad Declan had to follow him around to wipe down all his spilled drinks. “My niece’s there, helping with the grocery shopping. Says they’ve got a gaping hole in the middle of the cellar in the south wing that needs covering up. Says it smells something awful.”

“Bad piping,” one of the men shook his head. “Old houses are full of it.”

Some people turned away after that, looking almost disappointed by the lack of juicy information. Declan bet most of them still believed the secret treasure theory, and would continue to do so regardless of what they were told.

Declan had other concerns. He waited until McNab ran out of questions and then handed the two men a couple of drinks on the house, for good measure. After all, it couldn’t be easy working for the Fowls.

He thought back to the tiny pale face he’d only gotten glimpses of, driving away with his infamous butler on mysterious trips all around the world. Everyone had always said Artemis Fowl II would be a chip off the old block.

“What’s the kid like?” he allowed himself to ask the two sitting in front of him.

One of the men snorted. “He’s a piece of work, that’s for sure. I was more scared of him than I’ve been of any grown man—and I’ve known some powerful men, let me tell you.”

“I wouldn’t have believed he was a kid if I hadn’t been seeing him with my own eyes,” said the other man, shaking his head. “Gave us orders like he runs the place. I guess he does.”

He probably had been for a while now. What did it do to a child, to live with so much money and power and no parental authority? Most children would become spoiled brats, he supposed—but the Fowls had never done the same things normal people did.

Maybe, now that he had a mother back, the boy would have a chance to be a child again. But before he even asked, one of the exterminators offered up an answer.

“He’s a thin, ghostly pale kid, but you should have seen his face when Mrs. Fowl walked in—damn near made me tear up. I’ve got kids his age myself. Most kids his age hate their mums; it’s nice to see that love for a change.”

The conversation shifted to talk about kids, then, and Declan’s barman training had him smiling, nodding, and asking relevant personal questions, so the exterminators walked out satisfied with good drinks and good service.

But Declan looked out the window at the gates of the big Fowl mansion in the distance, and wondered what the boy was up to. Something sinister, no doubt. Something big that had bored a hole in the cellar and now required the mobilization of many workers. Something which, perhaps, had succeeded in curing his mother, even if everything else in the house died. If Artemis Fowl II was a chip off the old block, maybe those criminal talents were starting to be put to more interesting uses.

Well, he thought as he said goodbye to the patrons, locked up and headed home. He had kept his mouth shut years ago, with Artemis Fowl I, and he would keep his mouth shut now. There was no need to go around spreading gossip.


End file.
